Railway car



J y 1 4 o. JABELMANN 2,380,528 I I RAILWAY CAR. Origifial Filed De c, 29,1940 2 shee ts she-t 1 Jilly 4 Q o. .LIABELMANN 2,380,523

RAILWAY CAR Original F i led Dec. 20, 1940 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 'flaegiof." J Qia Jib man/ Wu Patented July 31, 1945 ma ns RAILWAY CAR Otto Jabelmann, Omaha, Nebn; Teresa R. Jabelmann administratrix of said Otto Jabelmann deceased Original application December 20, 1940, Serial No.

Divided and this application August 3, 1942. Serial No. 453,308

1 Claim.

This invention relates to vehicle bottom construction involving the use of a housing extending longitudinally of the vehicle between its sides for enclosing underneath equipment with aprons for controlling air currents at opposite sides of the housing, and the primary object of the invention is so to correlate the underneath equipment housing, the apron arrangement ,at the car sides, the plates underlying the underframe between the aprons and respective housing sides and between the truck pockets, and the folding step arranged at the ends of the car, that when the car is in motion and the steps are folded up against the trap doors the sheets carried by and concealing the underside of-the step are substantially in line with the car body housing when in closed position so that effective streamlining of the bottom of the car may be achieved to reduce train resistance at high speeds to a minimum.

The invention contemplates a streamlined undersurface arrangement for a railway car wherein the space from a truck pocket on one car to the truck pocket on thadioining car is smooth and streamlined with a step assembly so designed as to provide a surface flush with this smooth, fiat under surface of the car body and within the projected plane of the equipment housing extending the length of the vehicle between trucks whereby the whole combination provides an arrangement avoiding the formation or raising of dust clouds from the road ballast as the car travels thereover at high speed.

The foregoing and other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which- Fig. l is a side elevational view of a railway passenger-train car equipped in accordance with the invention and showing the streamlined vestibule arrangement, the apron depending from the car sides and the equipment housing extending between the trucks of the car;

Fig. 2 is a cross-sectional view taken on the line 2-2 of Fig. 1 through the lower portion of the car showing the apron arrangement associated with respectively adjacent housing sides for relieving side wind pressure against the housing sides by diverting the air outwardly and downwardly;

Figure 3 is a vertical, sectional view transversely of the car through the folding step and trap door at the ends of the car, taken on the line 3-3 of Fig. l and showing in full lines the position of the steps when folded up against the trap door between the bod end sill and bufier wings looking towards the adjacent truck, the step bottom cover plate being substantially within the projected zone of the body streamlining plates and the housing and the position of the steps when lowered being indicated in broken lines; and I Figure 4 is an enlarged fragmentary elevational view of the steps and adjacent bufi'er wing and body end sill members and trap door with the steps in raised position and showing the substantially streamlined relation of the step bottom cover plate and said members and body streamlining plate, the view being taken on line 4-4 of Fig. 3, looking in the direction indicated by the arrows.

This application is a div si n of my rnd n application, Serial No. 370,917, filed December 20, 1940, for Railway car, now Patent No. 2,318,863.

In the drawings, l0 represents the body of the car as a whole, H the underframe to which may be secured underneath equipment such as the water tanks l2 and fuel or air reservoirs l3 and other items of equipment arranged upon opposite sides of the longitudinal center of the car to prevent excessive swaying of the car body during train movement. In high-speed train movement for which this invention is particularly designed, it is important that all of the car body exposed to the action of winds tending to impede car travel be formed to present surfaces streamlined and free from projections which would offer possible obstruction to air flow with resultant lag in car movement. For cars fitted with underneath equipment, the desired streamlining of the underside of the car body is effected by means of a housing I5 for enclosing the motor, batteries. compressor and condenser units and control valves of the air conditioning system and formed to present smooth exterior surfaces at its oppo-" site and lower sides, as best shown in Figures 1 and 2. The sides l6 of the housing are arranged to slope downwardly and inwardly to the connecting floor ll of the housing and are secured at their upper margins l8 to respectively contiguous margins of laterally arranged extension plates l9 which extend longitudinally the full length of the car.

Upwardly and outwardly of the upper margins ill of the housing sides it extend the laterally arranged plates It virtually the full length of the car and underlying the side sills 35 and cross members 26 of the underframe ii to provide a smooth surface for the underside of the car body upon opposite sides of the housing proper to the 93 the lower portions of which are adapted for connection with adjacent margins of the cover plate. It will be noted from an inspection of Fig.

3 that the cover plate 83 throughout its length Fig. 1, the smooth exterior characterising the streamlined definition of the body at the vestibules of the car is preserved at the step position by arranging the portion 98 of the back streamlining housing of the movable step assembly to be flush with the car side 8 or with a door in substantially the plane of the car side when steps are raised, as best shown in Fig. 3. The steps as and that portion of the area of the cover plate 33 for a substantial distance inwardly from the car side are disposed as near as may be within the projected contours of streamlining plates I9 and the housing IS in order to reduce turbulence of air currents beneath the car to a minimum.

In the foregoing embodiment of the invention,

there has been provided a vehicle body having its underside effectively streamlined and substantially devoid of projecting surfaces, whereby the air currents induced by car movement or passing trains would be free to move unhampered for substantially the full length of the car.

What I claim is:

In a vehicle having an underframe and a body including a side wall, a bottom streamlining plate enclosing the undersurfaces of the underframe, and a vestibule step construction comprising the combination of a fixed step mounted between the body and said plate and a movable step assembly having a riser extending upwardy from its top tread'and a back streamlining housing for the remainder of its treads and risers, said assembly being pivotally mounted for swinging movement beneath the fixed step between a lower operative position in which said riser substantially engages said fixed step and an upper folded position in which said riser substantially engages the bottom streamlining plate and the back streamlining 

